Yellow Orchid
by inK.AddicTion
Summary: Molly visits Jim's grave, and struggles to reconcile Jim from IT and Jim Moriarty, mass-murderer. At his grave, she leaves a single yellow flower- the flowers he used to buy her. Two years later, Jim's face is all over the television, and a mysterious yellow flower appears...


_**Yellow Orchid**_

_**Molly visits Jim's grave, and struggles to reconcile Jim from IT and Jim Moriarty, mass-murderer. At his grave, she leaves a single yellow flower- the flowers he used to buy her. Two years later, Jim's face is all over the television, and a mysterious yellow flower appears.**_

((()))

Nervously, Molly Hooper rested her hand on the icy cold gate, peering at the cemetery beyond. The wrought iron black gate was wet with dew, and as she shifted on the spot, a bead of sharply cold water ran down her sleeve. Molly winced.

The cemetery was deserted, rows of blank grey headstones huddled in long straight lines like old soldiers too tired for war. Weeds unfolded splashes of colour amid the raging bushy grass, untrimmed, the yellow of dandelions, the pale pink-white daisies. Surly nettles and briars crouched over the tumbled walls enclosing the cemetery, round black and unripe red berries tempting an unwary hand to meet the bite of their thorns. Above all, bleak and unforgiving, the church tower rose, a solitary stark shape against the miserable, dull sky.

She shivered, not entirely from the cold, and pulled her coat closer around her as if the fabric could chase away the memory of ghostly arms around her waist, cold lips on her neck.

Mustering her courage, Molly opened the gate, cautiously readjusting her grip on the flowers she held in one hand and trying not to jump and wince at the shriek of the rusted hinges. Slowly she entered the graveyard, suppressing a shiver as a scream of wind came howling about her ankles.

She knew where to go, and picked her way there, starting at each unfriendly, unexpected noise. Tense nervousness roiled in her gut, curling thick, dark tendrils around her lungs so she could not breathe, and fear wrapped its icy, heavy weights over her shoulders, pushing her into the damp, muddy ground.

What was she doing here? He wouldn't want her here. She didn't even know him. Why did she care? She had known what he was. And Sherlock, Sherlock wouldn't care. She _knew _he was alive, he had to be.

She was being stupid and dull again, wasn't she? Funny how the one person that had made her feel best about herself had played her for the biggest fool.

She paused before a glossy black marble gravestone, the newest and shiniest in the cemetery, streaked with rain like tears. Beneath the gravestone, she knew, was an empty coffin. She knelt and placed the bouquet of lilies beneath the headstone, tracing the words engraved on it with quiet reverence. SHERLOCK HOLMES, it read.

There was a hundred things she wanted to say to him, far away wherever he was. She wanted to tell him to come home to John, who seemed to withdraw into that dark, desolate version of himself even more with each passing day, she wanted to tell him how much she missed him, how much she needed to know if he was okay, and a million other desperate, lonely thoughts that always seem to swarm her like a storm of hailstones when she thought of Sherlock out there fighting not only for his life but for all of those he loved, too.

She remembered him telling her she mattered, and her eyes pricked with tears. But she could not bring herself to say any of this, so instead Molly stared at Sherlock's name until her eyes burned and whispered in a hoarse, cracking voice, "Be safe."

She weighted that last almost-command with as much force as she could, praying somehow he heard her, would come home to John, DI Lestrade, Mrs Hudson, even his striking but very scary brother but not to Molly, because she knew despite his words that she did not matter.

Then she rose, blinked, breathed out, and turned to go.

The wind screamed. The rain fell. The lilies on Sherlock's grave beaded with water. The yellow orchid in her hand was protected by its cellophane wrapping and simply looked at her accusingly, as if to say, 'Did you forget _me_?'

She half-turned back towards the shiny headstone with the lilies, but something stayed her hand. She could not fathom placing this man's flowers on Sherlock's grave.

_Why am I doing this? _She thought as she protected the orchid in her coat, walking away from the empty grave.

Almost on the other side of the cemetery, separated by rows and rows of cold dead corpses, was another headstone, small, ugly, and dull, of misshapen grey granite, the flat simple words reading JIM MORIARTY, no dates, no message. It was also deserted, as if even the dead shrunk away from the shell of the spider.

Molly's breath caught in her throat and she felt goosebumps skate up her arms.

_Jim Moriarty._

She didn't know this man. She hated Moriarty for what he'd done.

But she wasn't sure if she hated Jim, her Jim, the Jim that had watched Glee with her and wore jeans she could tell he hated and read her fairy stories when they curled up together at night. Moriarty had played her, used her to get close to Sherlock. Molly hated Moriarty for using her and casting her aside like a soiled dishrag.

But...she had fallen in love with Jim, when she was with Jim it didn't matter anymore that she had mousy brown hair or her lips and breasts were too small and she was stupid, plain, dull, _ordinary, _and she didn't matter to anyone, because she mattered to Jim and he thought she was beautiful.

It just made it hurt all the more when she found out the man she was falling in love with was Moriarty, her first love's enemy.

And how could she choose between a man that wasn't real, who had _lied _to her, and loyalty to Sherlock, who needed her? It would always be Sherlock. She was just put on this world to perform autopsies and serve Sherlock like some sort of...she cut her thoughts off before they became too vitriolic. It was not Sherlock's fault.

She stared at the unassuming, ugly gravestone with JIM MORIARTY written on it and wondered how much of Jim, her Jim, was in Moriarty. How much was an act? She needed to know.

Did Moriarty read fairy stories late at night and drink tea so sweet it made Molly gag because he was too paranoid about people drinking out of his cup? Did he drive cars with the air-con set to Arctic and didn't like orange for no reason at all? Did he spend hours in the bathroom fussing over his reflection only to disregard it in the end? Would Moriarty like dancing in the rain and eating Belgian chocolate and hated caramel because it was too sticky but bought boxes of it anyway because he knew Molly liked it, was he so unsafe in the kitchen he could burn water and always managed to cut himself with a knife, would he use those silly dinosaur plasters and get Molly to put them on for him?

"I don't know you," she murmured softly to the silent gravestone, "I don't know the person called Moriarty who liked to play with Sherlock. But...I guess I knew Jim, who was nice to me, and maybe...maybe he was never real and maybe he didn't exist, but I like to think this grave is as much his as it is yours."

Then she knelt, and hesitantly placed the yellow orchid at the headstone. Jim loved yellow flowers. He was always buying them for Molly.

Tentatively she placed her hand over the inscribed JIM and tried to ignore the prickling in her eyes and the lump in her throat. She thought about Moriarty, and suddenly felt even more foolish. Who was she kidding?

_Will I never learn? _she thought dully. _I don't matter. I'm just a pawn. I'm such an idiot. _She rose quickly and made her way out of the graveyard without looking back once.

Tom met her at the gate with a pained smile. She took his hand and tried to ignore how much he looked like Sherlock as they walked off, leaving Molly's ever divided heart behind.

((()))

Two years passed, in the slow, sudden way years do. Molly worked at the morgue during the day and at night came home to Tom, who more often than not stayed at her house. She could not quite let him move in yet, but his shirts had replaced the empty spaces in her wardrobe, and his aftershave had a place on her sink. He loved her, and Molly's confidence in herself only increased. She became stronger, firmer, more adventurous, and began going out and getting friends.

Tom finally proposed, and she accepted, although she did not love him explosively, passionately, like she had loved before, but more like a warm, steady burn that was closer akin to the fondness she felt for her cat Toby.

Sherlock returned with a bang, and almost immediately fell into place with John, once the stocky doctor had forgiven him, and Molly breathed easier knowing he was safe. Then Molly and Tom broke up, John got married, Sherlock shot a man, and then it happened.

Molly Hooper flashed her card at the door and it beeped. She pushed the door open and padded down the long, cold corridor to the mortuary.

It was nine o'clock and she was coming in for her shift at Bart's, although her mind was anywhere but. Sherlock was going to be flown out to the East on a mission. She worried desperately for him, he had rung her the previous night to say goodbye, and his voice had been curiously flat the entire time, so Molly knew there was more than he said. She pitied John, too. With Mary...she could sympathise.

She let herself into the mortuary and went about her routine, tying her hair back, putting on her lab coat, sanitizing her hands, before logging on to the computer to see what autopsies she had for the day.

The screen had just warmed up on to the desktop when it suddenly went ominously dark. Molly tapped a few keys and clicked the mousse, confused.

Suddenly, a familiar face popped up on the screen, and she heard, "Did you miss me? Did you miss me? Did you miss me?"

Molly screamed and fell backwards off her chair, thudding painfully against the floor. She could not tear her eyes from Jim Moriarty's grinning, _dead _face, a face that she herself had seen, covered in blood and with a clean bullet hole through his brain. She'd done the autopsy herself! God, that Irish voice!

"Did you miss me? Did you miss me?"

_I can't stay here,_ she thought wildly_, I have to leave. I can't-_

"Did you miss me?"

_-I have to go-_

"Did you miss me?"

_-He's alive, God, he's alive-_

"Did you miss me?"

_-Oh God, thank you God-_

"Did you miss me?"

_-Wait, what?-_

"Doctor Hooper!" the feminine voice broke into her panic, and Molly suddenly registered the presence of slim hands on her shoulders, the absence of that mocking Irish voice.

She blinked, startled, her chest heaving as she tried to control her breathing. She narrowed her eyes at the woman. She had seen her before, trailing after Sherlock's handsome, creepy brother. His PA?

"Who are you?" she demanded, her heart still thumping in her chest wildly.

"You may call me Annabel," said the woman, "I believe you are acquainted with my employer's brother, a Mr Sherlock Holmes? My employer sent me to escort you home." Annabel stood and offered a delicate hand.

Molly stared at her suspiciously, then sighed and took the hand, getting to her feet. Right on time, her phone chimed with an incoming text. She dug it out of her pocket and groaned when she saw,

**Text Message From: Sherlock Holmes**

**Go with her. -SH**

She sighed again, resigned, and followed Annabel mutely, who gave her a tiny smile Molly couldn't help but respond to. The woman led her outside to a dark car.

Molly flinched at the "Did you miss me?" from every shopfront. She got in quickly and they drove in silence to Molly's house.

Jim was alive. Moriarty was alive. She couldn't tell whether the knowledge made her terrified or...or what? Happy?

_This is insane, _she thought, sinking low into her seat to avoid the dark eyes flashing from every screen.

She'd done the autopsy. This was impossible. Jim was alive! Was he? Jim was a trick, he was never alive.

Molly was shaken out of her thoughts by the slow motion of the car gliding to a smooth stop outside her house. She stammered a thank you and Annabel favoured her with a briefly affectionate smile.

"You will be safe here," the sophisticated woman told Molly gently, "this house is watched."

Molly wasn't sure if that was a good thing, but she nodded awkwardly and hurried out of the car. She all but ran up the gravel path to her house, feeling cold and exposed in the open. When she closed the door behind her, a weight seemed to fall off her shoulders.

She sighed, and shrugged off her lab coat. She'd return it tomorrow- if she was going in to work tomorrow morning.

"What am I going to do?" she whispered.

She padded into her living room, flipping on lights as she went. She stopped dead.

On the living room table were three yellow orchids.

Molly's heart drummed in her ears. She looked around nervously. Untouched, but for the innocuous flowers on the table. She stepped towards them, lifting the flowers with shaking hands.

Yellow orchids. Jim's favourite. Their flower.

A card fluttered out of the bundle. She picked it up. In a curling, elegant script, the card read,

_If I may have two names, I have one heart. It's time to dance, Cinderella._

_-JM_

Even as a cold chill of fear raced up her spine, a smile touched Molly Hooper's lips.

She had her answer.


End file.
